The History of MTW

[Servius]

On speed of battles, both games have a base speed at which units move and kill each other. MTW had a super-simple .txt file which contained all the unit variables (attack value, defense value, walk speed, run speed, charge speed, turn speed, etc.) In MTW, those variables were easily moddable. In RTW, many were hard-coded in with the 3D animations, so they couldn't be easily changed by modders.

RTW battles are, on average, much faster than MTW battles. Two RTW units can collide and one can wipe the other out in like 2 seconds (depending on units). RTW units break (morale) a lot quicker than MTW units did, which makes the battles even shorter. RTW infantry move at lightening speed, almost as fast as cavalry, whereas MTW units move at more realistic relative speeds. For an easy comparison, you can generally think of RTW units as having much lower morale and armor compared to MTW. They run away quicker and they die quicker.

Also on speed, MTW had this very simple but very cool and handy speed bar. You just slid this little bar to the right and the battle speed accelerated. You had complete control between the standard and max speed. In RTW, that was simplified to like two pre-set speed acceleration rates. So, like in many things, at least in my opinion, RTW was dumbed down and options were taken away from players.

As to maps, the MTW map was very Risk-like. As I said above, you either controlled a province or you didn't. In RTW, there mind as well not even be provinces, since you only 'control' cities and whatever part of the country-side you have a dominant army in. There were no roaving bands of annoying skirmisher rebels in MTW. There were your armies, allied armies, enemy armies, and occasionally rebel units would spawn if the province was pissed off/disloyal.

In RTW, if your army was in a forest tile and a fight ensued, the game used a forest map that roughly approximated the surrounding area. In MTW, you either fought a battle in Flanders or in Normady. The game randomly selected maps from a set (like lush_european_flat_river or desert_hills). While I like the ability in RTW to have a bit more control over the kind of battlefield you'll fight in, I think the actual battle maps in RTW were crappy, because there were hardly any significant terrain features besides rivers and their bridges. In MTW, hills and forests had a much more significant impact on the outcome of a battle than they do in RTW. So, given the choice, I prefer MTW battle maps.

Last thing about maps, if I attacked Flanders from Normady, there's a variable that says whether there are rivers between Normandy and Flanders. If there are rivers, the game pulled up a river map with the appropriate climate. If not, no river. The terrain (lush, arid, hilly, flat, etc.) was determined by the terrain in the defending province.

[Quietus]

More differences:

- Excessive maneuvers in RTW doesn't seem to be penalized.
- RTW units rarely get exhausted.
- Both RTW and MTW campaign map difficulty is the initial expansion phase. However, beyond that, RTW campaign is longer without using the "exterminate" the city function.
- Mercenary recruitment in MTW isn't as important.
- Princesses are useless and unnecessary (other than to spy on neighbors).
- You can groom any general unit in MTW.
- You can only trade with foreign factions in MTW (not perfectly sure of this since I didn't do specific tests). And there's no land trade between your cities.
- Ransoming (was one of the few improvement of MTW over STW).


Some similar aspects:
- Both are easy to build the economy (because building, training and upkeep are relatively low).
- Good players are penalized with economic vices (Aren't good players supposed to be rewarded not punished?)

[Perplexed]

- Both RTW and MTW campaign map difficulty is the initial expansion phase

This is true. In all of the TW games the most challenging part was the initial expansion. However I, like, I am sure, many others here, take challenging to mean more fun. Therefore, I say that the most fun in any TW game is in the preliminary stages of a campaign.

Unfortunately, the preliminary stages of a campaign are obviously only preliminary, so the fun does not last long. One way to fix this would be to create a feature by which empires which have swollen to an unchallenging level go into decline as a result of certain stimuli.

For example, say one empire, controlled by the player, is expanded from one province to twenty, in the reign of one influential king or a short line of influential kings. Under the enlightened rulership of these rulers, the empire is stable, but when a strong king dies and a weak monarch takes the throne, there should be more of a penalty for the empire, such as decreased morale in armies, less income, more unrest in frontier provinces, riots, civil wars, etc. This would work for the computer as well. A computer empire that grows too large will inevitably decline just as a player kingdom would.

Of course, it isn't necessarily only weak monarchs that make this decline possible. A large kingdom that suffers a disastrous defeat in battle should also suffer from the penalties of decline (this would also give crushing victories more of a meaning, as it would not only take away the enemy's fighting men, but would cause unrest in the kingdom as well. Massive victories would be more rewarding and have more gravity). Other examples of decline-causing stimuli include droughts, plagues, remnants of past monarchies who were overthrown by the current line causing unrest and rebellion; the list can go on for a while.

This step (which I expect to be opposed by many on this forum who don't like their hard work to be "destroyed" in such a way) would keep the action fresh nonetheless, and keep the campaign map a colorful and exciting place (less countries annihalated by larger empires, more prolonged conflict, etc.) and it would keep, as is the point of my post, the game more fun with many challenging stages throughout the campaign.

[Servius]

On generals...

In MTW, every time you built a unit, any unit, it had a chance to have general stars. The liklihood was determined by a LOW, MEDIUM, or HIGH setting in the massive .txt file that had every unit variable in it (which is also why MTW was way easier and better to mod). So for example, spearmen had LOW but Royal Knights had HIGH.

So you could build Royal Knights and some would come out with one or two, maybe three stars.

Then there were pre-set heroes, like William Wallace, Strongbow FitzGilbert, El Cid, etc. which the game would assign to a unit, again based on their liklihood to get a general, after a certain date. So for the English, the first Royal Knight unit you build after like 1098 will be Strongbow I think, something like that. Strongbow came out with 4-6 stars. Each faction had different numbers of these historical hero units waiting to be spawned after certain dates. Also, in MTW, the characters could die, but the units retained the stats. So Strongbow would die, and random person X would take over that unit, but still have all of Strongbow's Command stars, Accumen, Dread, etc.

Then on top of all that there was a system of assigning governorship. Once you captured a province, a little icon appeared on the game map that looked like a scroll. This was the title of Lord for that region. You could also build certain buildings which created additional titles, like Constable of the Tower or Marshall of the Horse, Warden of the Clinque Ports and so on. Anyway, each of these titles conveyed stat boost to which ever unit you granted the title to. Every title granted some boost to the unit's loyalty. Some granted additional Command stars, Accumen, Dread, and Peity.

EVERY unit in the game has a Command, Accumen, Dread, Loyalty, and Piety stat. So, a common practice was to make cheap 100-man units with at least 4 Accumen the governor of a province. The lordships and other titles that granted Command start could be given to your top commanders to increase their power on the battlefield.

It was an awesome system, very flexible, very realistic too, and very simple. As a king, you could make even a peasant unit the lord or a province if you wanted (if they had high loyalty and high Accumen). Only the king and his immediate heirs could not be granted these titles. However, former heirs no longer in the line of succession could be granted titles. I really hope that system comes back.

[ZombieFriedNuts]

I played Rome total war first and couldn’t get the hang of medieval I tried though

[Dutch_guy]

well it does take some time to love Medieval, the graphics are killing especially if you - and so you have - play Rome before Medieval.

However once you play a little further in the campaign you learn to love those foreign civil wars, the re emerging factions, the crusades, AI ( yes even the AI ! ), Golden horde ( ) and the diversity between the Katholic, Muslim and Orthodox factions.

[aw89]

The graphics really aren't a problem, they don’t do anything negative to the gameplay. (Maybe a little on unit recognition, but that’s really insignificant)

Then there were pre-set heroes, like William Wallace, Strongbow FitzGilbert, El Cid, etc. which the game would assign to a unit, again based on their liklihood to get a general, after a certain date. So for the English, the first Royal Knight unit you build after like 1098 will be Strongbow I think, something like that. Strongbow came out with 4-6 stars. Each faction had different numbers of these historical hero units waiting to be spawned after certain dates

Strongbow isn't ristricted to royal knights, I had him as feudal sargeants unit.

[lars573]

Don't forget the really bad (counter intuetive with far too many buttons in your face) battle interface. Coupled with the cheating AI (when higher than medium) made MTW battles unplayable.

[Martok]

Don't forget the really bad (counter intuetive with far too many buttons in your face) battle interface. Coupled with the cheating AI (when higher than medium) made MTW battles unplayable.

Actually, the AI only receives artifical bonuses on the Expert level. It doesn't cheat on Easy, Normal, or Hard.

And I wouldn't call MTW's battle interface counter-intuitive, although I agree Rome's overall was easier to understand. Medieval's interface simply had a lot more options than Rome's--various different unit/army formations, standing orders (hold position/engage at will), etc.

[Monarch]

On speed of battles, both games have a base speed at which units move and kill each other. MTW had a super-simple .txt file which contained all the unit variables (attack value, defense value, walk speed, run speed, charge speed, turn speed, etc.) In MTW, those variables were easily moddable. In RTW, many were hard-coded in with the 3D animations, so they couldn't be easily changed by modders.

RTW battles are, on average, much faster than MTW battles. Two RTW units can collide and one can wipe the other out in like 2 seconds (depending on units). RTW units break (morale) a lot quicker than MTW units did, which makes the battles even shorter. RTW infantry move at lightening speed, almost as fast as cavalry, whereas MTW units move at more realistic relative speeds. For an easy comparison, you can generally think of RTW units as having much lower morale and armor compared to MTW. They run away quicker and they die quicker.

Also on speed, MTW had this very simple but very cool and handy speed bar. You just slid this little bar to the right and the battle speed accelerated. You had complete control between the standard and max speed. In RTW, that was simplified to like two pre-set speed acceleration rates. So, like in many things, at least in my opinion, RTW was dumbed down and options were taken away from players.

As to maps, the MTW map was very Risk-like. As I said above, you either controlled a province or you didn't. In RTW, there mind as well not even be provinces, since you only 'control' cities and whatever part of the country-side you have a dominant army in. There were no roaving bands of annoying skirmisher rebels in MTW. There were your armies, allied armies, enemy armies, and occasionally rebel units would spawn if the province was pissed off/disloyal.

In RTW, if your army was in a forest tile and a fight ensued, the game used a forest map that roughly approximated the surrounding area. In MTW, you either fought a battle in Flanders or in Normady. The game randomly selected maps from a set (like lush_european_flat_river or desert_hills). While I like the ability in RTW to have a bit more control over the kind of battlefield you'll fight in, I think the actual battle maps in RTW were crappy, because there were hardly any significant terrain features besides rivers and their bridges. In MTW, hills and forests had a much more significant impact on the outcome of a battle than they do in RTW. So, given the choice, I prefer MTW battle maps.

Last thing about maps, if I attacked Flanders from Normady, there's a variable that says whether there are rivers between Normandy and Flanders. If there are rivers, the game pulled up a river map with the appropriate climate. If not, no river. The terrain (lush, arid, hilly, flat, etc.) was determined by the terrain in the defending province.

Just a few comments on that post...

In RTW cavalry are not a similar speed to infantry when running, go into a custom battle and give them a race.

I'll give you the fact MTW made more use of surroundings, but still, the ability to generate whats on the campaign map onto the battle map is a great feature, adding realism/ I've even seen a battle fought on the shorline where my navy, floating around nearby, has been generated into the battle map.

Due to the risk style format of mtw, this is obviously impossible, but randomly generating a map from a set pack is hardly wonderful.

Also I think that in ancient times there would have been more 'tribes' rebels/brigands. However in Medieval with united kingdoms there would have been much less. Perhaps this is the reason for more rebels appearing in Rome. Once more, realism.

" In MTW, those variables were easily moddable. In RTW, many were hard-coded in with the 3D animations, so they couldn't be easily changed by modders."

Heh, comes with the 3d territory imo. MTW engine was relatively 'super simple' in comparison with Rome.

Yes, I agree that the speed bar should be brought back. Run and walk is not enough. Also in agreement that battles should be longer.

Anyhow, good idea for a topic.

Edit: Oh and dont forget the weather. MTW had more realistic 'storms' and such compared to rome.

[Casmin]

Also I think that in ancient times there would have been more 'tribes' rebels/brigands. However in Medieval with united kingdoms there would have been much less. Perhaps this is the reason for more rebels appearing in Rome. Once more, realism.

Hmm. A good thought but I'd have to disagree. Maybe more tribes during ancient times but kingdoms weren't really united until late Medieval/Rennaissance history. Besides Rome eventually became (within the timeframe of RTW) a more cohesive nation than any Medieval country could have dreamed of.

I think in essence the appearance of rebels in RTW was just undertested by CA. I don't think they realized how annoying they were to the gameplay until after the release.